The Metric System On my walk up to the castle I bumped into "Peter" an elderly man, who I'm sure befriends tourists on a regular basis! We had a great chat, and he's sure that America will convert to the Metric system in the next 10 years.

Ljubljana is the capital of Slovenia, one of the parts of the former Yugoslavia. The city itself is very small, and can be easily explored on foot. There's a very definite cafe culture - the locals seem to like nothing more that sitting outside, drinking a cup of coffee, and watching the world go by!

Alleyway, Ljubljana

There are two "hubs" to the city, the first has to be the castle perched on the hill above the city - if it's not all the tourists, it's the locals dressed in their finery getting married!

The other hub has to be market right by the river in the centre of town - it's a right old mish-mash, with local produce, flowers, and tourist nicknaks jostling for position.

There are three main bridges that cross the river that winds its way throughout the city, there's the Dragon bridge looked over by statues of dragons! Then there is the Cobblers bridge, where in days gone by the traders used to congregate, outside the city, and hence outside the tax collectors grasp!

Finally there's the triple bridge which is exactly that, three bridges all connected to each other.

I stayed in the Hotel Park a five minute walk to the north east of the centre - it's a clean tidy hotel with a good location.

Ljubljana from the Castle

I guess the weirdest thing that I saw while I was in Ljubljana was a building that had an entrance about 20 feet off the ground, and the steps leading to it? A set of mobile aircraft steps that appeared to have been stolen / borrowed from the local airport.

What was surprising is that no-one had moved the steps away (as they had a set of wheels), that would have been a nasty surprise when stepping out of your door first thing in the morning!